Inviting Friends to Lobby: Interest Groups, Ideological Bias, and Congressional Committees

Kollman, Ken

doi:10.2307/2111775

Cited by 112 publications

(70 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…The approach taken is rooted in the congressional literature, where this once live debate appears settled: organized interests hardly ever lobby their opponents, and only occasionally interact with those yet to decide (Baumgartner and Leech, 1996;Kollman, 1997;Hojnacki and Kimball, 1998). The underlying logic for this behaviour is provided by the signalling literature, which emphasizes the importance of a lobbyist's reputation for providing good quality policy information as a means of overcoming information asymmetries (Parker, 2004).…”

Section: Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The reason for this lack of interest may simply be that the explanation is considered self-evident. After all, it is more or less accepted that interest groups have a strong preference to lobby their friends (Baumgartner and Leech, 1996;Kollman, 1997;Hojnacki and Kimball, 1998), which in the EP translates to seeking advocacy from ideologically congruent political parties (Wessels, 1999). Indeed, these preferences underpin the main argument of the article.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Explaining Interest Group Interactions with Party Group Members in the European Parliament: Dominant Party Groups and Coalition Formation

Marshall

2014

J of Common Market Studies

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This article develops and tests a theory of party group lobbying that demonstrates how the European Parliament's decision-making process shapes interest group interactions with legislators. Interest group behaviour is highly conditional on two motivations: lobby powerful MEPs, and lobby friendly MEPs. Friendliness is based on ideology, with power shaped by institutional rules and seat share. These goals can mutually reinforce each other. However, because these two motivations exist, and because political power is not fully predictable, there are strong incentives for interest groups to lobby party groups that are non-natural allies to ensure that their policy information reaches the winning side. But, when interest groups engage in this behaviour, they retain their preference to lobby the friendliest members. The analysis is carried out on nine policy-related categories of interest group, with MEP data from three parliaments in the period 1999-2011, combined with information on the parliamentary role of 724 respondents.

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Section: Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Explaining Interest Group Interactions with Party Group Members in the European Parliament: Dominant Party Groups and Coalition Formation

Marshall

2014

J of Common Market Studies

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“…Firstly, career concerns in the lobbying industry can potentially affect the actions taken by serving government officials (Leaver 2009). Secondly, 1 For instance, Wright (1990), Kollman (1997), Baumgartner and Leech (1998), Hojnack and Kimball (1998) what is right only some of the time. The same poll found that 64% believed that 'government is pretty much run by a few big interests looking out for themselves'.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Revolving Door Lobbyists

Vidal

Draca

Fons‐Rosen

2012

American Economic Review

447

116

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Washington's `revolving door' -the movement from government service into the lobbying industry-is regarded as a major concern for policy-making. We study how ex-government staffers benefit from the personal connections acquired during their public service. Lobbyists with experience in the office of a US Senator suffer a 24% drop in generated revenue when that Senator leaves office. The effect is immediate, discontinuous around the exit period and long-lasting. Consistent with the notion that lobbyists sell access to powerful politicians, the drop in revenue is increasing in the seniority of and committee assignments power held by the exiting politician.

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“…Evaluating the relative importance of political connections is critical for understanding the value that lobbyists provide for their clients and, more generally, to assess the role of 1 For instance, Wright (1990), Kollman (1997), Grossman and Helpman (2001), Ansolabehere et al (2002), de Figuereido and Silverman (2006), Hall and Deardoff (2006), Baumgartner et al (2009), Bombardini and Trebbi (2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Revolving Door Lobbyists

2010

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We study how ex-government officials benefit from the personal connections acquired during public service. Lobbyists with experience in the office of a US Senator suffer a 24% drop in generated revenue when that Senator leaves office. The effect is immediate, discontinuous around the exit period, and long-lasting. Consistent with the notion that lobbyists sell access to powerful politicians, the drop in revenue is increasing in the committee assignments power held by the exiting politician.Keywords: Lobbying, Revolving Door, US Congress, Political Connections, Political Elites.JEL Classification: H11, J24, J45. * We thank Nick Bloom, Andy Eggers, Steve Machin, Ignacio Palacios-Huerta, Yona Rubinstein, Ken Shepsle and James Snyder for insightful comments. We also thank participants at various conferences and seminars where we presented various versions of this work. We are grateful to the Centre for Responsive Politics, Columbia Books and LegiStorm for answering our questions regarding the data used in this paper. The Center for Economic Performance provided generous funding. We thank Johannes Schmieder for sharing STATA code with us. Victoria Loidl, Vithal Mittal and Jagveer Singh Kang provided excellent research assistance. All errors remain our own.

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Inviting Friends to Lobby: Interest Groups, Ideological Bias, and Congressional Committees

Cited by 112 publications

References 30 publications

Explaining Interest Group Interactions with Party Group Members in the European Parliament: Dominant Party Groups and Coalition Formation

Explaining Interest Group Interactions with Party Group Members in the European Parliament: Dominant Party Groups and Coalition Formation

Revolving Door Lobbyists

Revolving Door Lobbyists

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